The Scarlet Sword
by Jade Lark-dragon
Summary: What if it was more than just Tomoe's death that motivated Kenshin's non-killing oath? Thrust into another world and time, Kenshin struggles with the appearance of his inner demon and fights to find a way back.


_Tomoe_.

Her name was all he kept in his mind, outside the howling of snow-winds in his ears and his heart. Wounds aching against the bitter cold, Kenshin hugged Tomoe in his arms. Despite the undeniable lack - of her heartbeat, her breathing, the flow of blood, all signs he knew all too well – of life, he didn't want to let go.

Everything was so cold. Her look of peaceful sleep was at odds with the crimson staining her clothes from the gaping slash. He'd killed her, with the swing that he'd meant to slay the Yaminobu's leader.

 _I was too slow,_ the swordsman bitterly railed, his cheek against Tomoe's pitch-black hair _.I should have_ killed _those Yaminobu from the start, instead of waiting out of some caution!_ What use was strength if weaker fighters could take advantage of him? What use was his training if his wariness had let them be lost, so that Tomoe had died by his own hands?

 _The hitokiri would have defeated them more easily,_ Kenshin thought, the realized truth more painful than any poisoned knife. _Tomoe's peace saved me, and killed her._ The cold honed mind of a hitokiri, that which he'd let the warmth of love push away too far.

He didn't know what to feel. Didn't _want_ to. Couldn't. Better to focus on the here-and-now, stand, so he could go to give his former wife the proper rites-

Silk and wool disappeared from his touch, and all the scents and sounds of the forest - pine-needles, rising blizzard snows, the iron-tang of blood – melted away.

 _What-_ Kenshin snapped open his eyes, heart blind with panic at the loss of Tomoe's weight, he _had not_ let go-

A flash of light, and he clamped down on the urge to cry out. Sweeping his surroundings, the swordsman had to blink away melting tears. _I know I've yet to fully recover from the battles earlier, but… where am I?_

Aching wounds and bone-deep weariness gone as if they'd never been, he stood in a seemingly endless corridor. Split between two different types of ki with either a white or black glow stretching from either side, with no visible wood paneling nor stone-

"Well this is unusual."

Kenshin whirled backwards with katana drawn; the male voice had appeared from _nowhere_. A blonde-haired with odd Western-looking garb rose from a paper-strewn desk in the white hall as if a Western-official. _He has_ no _presence_ , he barely registered with alarm-

"Hmph. _My_ claim is stronger."

He whirled again, to the sight of a younger girl with almost Nippon features in the slant of her eyes, in a black Western dress with a pout on her face amidst the darker half of the hall.

But she wasn't of Nippon, nor of Shina. Both strangers had no hidden flickers of ki, no presences to speak of at all.

"You know the rules," The blonde man replied while touching his eyeglasses, walking towards the boundary with an unchanging expression. "Call." There was nothing in his blue-eyes towards Kenshin - who kept his back close to the wall while barely controlling his own breathing – nothing when the swordsman gripped his katana's hilt in readiness.

"Why am I here?" Kenshin interrupted, shifting his saya as if polished wood could ground him against the sudden strangeness of this whole situation. "What is your purpose towards me?"

 _This feels too_ real _to be a hallucination. But… Tomoe was starting to freeze._ Her kimono had been so stiff when he'd picked her up…

The man and the girl both ignored him. "Fine. Even," the girl said with a wave of her gloved hand.

The man curtly nodded. "Odd." Then tossed a small object – an ivory six-faced dice - into the air.

Irritation, and the sheer amount of _pain_ from the past hours overcame any wariness and instinct; the hitokiri moved. _I've had enough of this vision._ "Answer me," he said flatly, slicing through the dice _-_

For his blade to meet nothing but air. The dice fell to the ground with four tiny circles carved into ivory face-up, untouched when he tried to touch it again. "What is this-?" he muttered in shock.

"Hah!" the girl cried. "I win!" The following smirk from the girl, her long black tresses fanning out with as with malice sent alarm ringing through the redhead-

Ki howled to life from a dark-lit door. Unseen forces tugged then grabbed; the hitokiri bolted, straining against the scream of the vortex dragging him backwards, unable to stab purchase into unyielding shadow-walls-

Past a screen separating silence from sound, into the open air of an unclouded snowless night sky and cricket's song.

" _No-!_ "

Before unconsciousness claimed him.

* * *

The scent of musty hay and moldering wood was the first thing he noticed through the haze of sleep. No plum-blossoms… _Tomoe…? Where-_

" _Kuso-!"_ Sitting up, Kenshin frantically searched his surroundings. The air was autumn-chill instead of the biting cold winter, heavy with streaming rain; he laid without wounds on a heap of old hay in an old open animal shelter, the hill surrounded-

By a field marred by an ongoing battle; rain-blurred figures churned the ground into mud with their struggle while horses neighed and shrieked in the distance to the furious clangor of striking metal.

 _I cannot stay here._ To do so would risk being unwillingly found by either one of the armies. He needed to retreat, gather intelligence on just where he was; never mind the seed of suspicion about his untouched state nor his scar-free face.

 _I need to go back._

He made for the trees at a walking pace, panic rising with everything he noticed. Heavy plate armor without the mark of colored robes to cover them, full helmets when bullets and city-fighting of the Revolution had rendered them ill-favored.

A few foot soldiers blinded by battle made to strike at Kenshin, those wearing unpainted leather and chainmail. He dodged them all; none made to come after him, busy as they were with opponents wearing armor painted a similar shade to his own indigo-blue robes but no other resemblance to the Ishin Shishi.

When hoof-beats thudded behind him, a glance backwards revealed a lone cavalryman closer than the others. Despite the curtain of rain, Kenshin could see the unwavering gallop of the horse, the helm-shadowed face topped by a sodden dark feather-crest. He sidestepped the charge-

 _Wham_.

 _-_ to be sent flying by a hammer hidden by a cloak-hidden hammer, barely softened by his instinctive turn, his head ringing and wakizashi shattered from the force of the blow. _Wha-? He was aiming for_ me. Kenshin broke into a run, aching ribs keeping him at a slower speed.

Despite the miraculous disappearance of the wounds from the Yaminobu, he could still feel the chill of the mountain-winter in his mind slowing his limbs. The rider pounded after him, carelessly sweeping blue-painted soldiers aside with the hammer. For whatever reason –uncovered hair, lack of armor, blue colors – the teen had caught his attention. Already he was wounded again by something he should have seen coming. _Again, again,_ again-!

The redhead stopped. Turned, the emotion-dull of the hitokiri rising with a sudden speed that hitched his breath, before smoothing into the controlled evenness of training. Just like before. Except…

There was cold, cold _rage_ burning behind the usual unclouded clarity of the hitokiri. Winter-blizzards burying his doubts, hesitation, grief in their icy depths, as he waited with bowed head against the rain for the arrogant confidence of the hammer-wielding rider.

"You will not kill me," Battousai stated aloud, uncaring that the words went unheard under the din of noise. _I will return for you Tomoe._

 _No matter what it takes._

 _"_ _Ryukansen-Kogarashi!"_

The horse charged away riderless; away from amber eyes with inhumanly slit-pupils.

And his left cheek stung with fresh crossed scars.

* * *

Notes and explanation

 _Yaminobu –_ the group of pro-Shogunate omnitsu assigned to killing important members of the Ishin Shishi, including Battousai.

Hitokiri – manslayer, assassin

Ki – energy, life-force. One of the names for the energy behind many of the supernatural feats performed in both RK and Drifters canon.

Katana – Japanese longsword.

Nippon – Japanese name for Japan.

Shina – Japanese term for China, used until around end of WWII

Saya – sheath for katanas.

Kimono – Japanese dress for females

 _Kuso_ – Interjection, damn it.

Wakizashi – Japanese short sword of samurai

 _Ryukansen-Kogarashi_ – "Dragon Coil Flash: Wintry Wind" quickest & weakest form of the spinning Ryukansen.


End file.
